


As the Sirius Sleeps

by ChatoyantPenumbra



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Feels, Brief Psychotic Breaks, Canon-Typical Violence, Coma, Depression, During Timeskip (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Eventual Romance, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route Spoilers, M/M, Masc Byleth, Mental Health Issues, Multi, Nonbinary My Unit | Byleth, Other, Pining, Psychosis, Slow Burn, Tragic Romance, did i really just tag that sobs, many characters won't show up until later chapters, no beta we die like Glenn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:20:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22357060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChatoyantPenumbra/pseuds/ChatoyantPenumbra
Summary: After Dedue helps Dimitri escape his execution in Fhirdiad, Dimitri returns to Garreg Mach Monastery. This time, he finds his Professor among the rivers at the base of the cliff, but not at all in the state he would have expected. The future King's mental state follows a different path during the timeskip, and Fódlan's history will forever be changed.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/My Unit | Byleth
Comments: 74
Kudos: 311





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've had this idea in my head for months now but because I was crunching for con, I wasn't able to start it until now! Sorry about that! Anyway, I always headcanoned that Dimitri would return to the Monastery after escaping execution to at least try to find Byleth, but after coming up with nothing, I think his mental state would degrade so much in his grief and solitude that he returned to Faerghus to begin hunting the generals and forces of the Empire. But what would happen if Dimitri found Byleth in their comatose state instead?
> 
> I have a very vivid idea of where I'm going with this fic until a certain point of resolution, but I'm unsure if I'll continue until the end of the war and post-war. I guess it depends on reception and inspiration.

Blood.

It coats the entirety of him, sticking to his flesh and causing the furs on his body to drape heavily against his back. The new partial blindness is still jarring as he hobbles, the cuts on his body from escaping Fhirdiad only days old, but old enough that Dimitri fears infection. Stolen armor covers his being, just slightly too big for his body, but when he had been faced with the decision of taking what he could from the soldiers he killed on the way out of Faerghus’ capital or being surely killed himself without its protection, he had little option in the pursuit of survival. 

The pain from his eye is so excruciating that it has nearly come full circle to a level that he can ignore. His entire body screams with it, every synapse firing with every beat of his trembling heart, and it has been so constant over the course of the last several days that if he were asked to describe the pain he felt now like he would have been in a trip to the Monastery infirmary, he’s not sure how he would respond. It feels like it had dug so deep into the core of his being that a separation from it would surely mean his death. 

He touches the soaked bandage wrapped around his head and covering his right eye, tacky from drying as he moves ever longer across the countryside to a destination he prays with his last hopes to the Goddess he can reach. Garreg Mach Monastery sits as a toy version of itself along the mountains in the distance, still releasing a thin trail of smoke into the skies above it from its destructive siege two weeks ago.

The setting sun is a harsh orange on the landscape, nearly crimson like the sanguine that covers him. It’s a glaring contrast to how he has seen this field hundreds of times before, painting every blade of grass and every track of soldier’s boot and war horse’s hoof in the dirt with the horrifying aftermath of the battle that took place here a fortnight prior. He begins to pass shattered weapons the Empire’s forces left behind, charred earth, pieces of broken armor, and nausea kicks at the back of his throat. 

_Chase them, my son. Avenge us._

Dimitri bites back the pain of his father’s voice, the throbbing of a migraine he didn’t even realize until now was there growing stronger when he feels strong hands grab at his wrists and tug him in the direction of the tracks.

South.

Enbarr.

_Your Highness, do not allow my death to have been in vain._

Tears form. It mixes with the coagulated blood beneath the bandages on his lost eye, and it stings— _Goddess, how it stings_ —and the crimson mixture floods down his cheeks in twin streams. Dimitri cries into the earth already soaked with the blood and tears of hundreds of others. 

“Dedue… Father… I promise I will save you all from your pain, but I…”

In the distance, he hears the sound of brick and stone collapsing within the cracked walls of the Monastery as a plume of dust shoots into the fiery air and ever-so-slowly dissipates whilst he struggles closer. 

And even in the midst of chaos, in the face of death, of injury, of what feels like the edge of the very world, there is one face that remains pristine and clear. A smile. Mesmerizing. Loving. Grounding.

Haunting.

“The Professor… he is my only hope.”

Dimitri pushes harder against the spear he uses to guide his steps, and it snaps clean in half from the strain and damage it had already sustained. The Prince falls to his knee, hisses at the impact, and rises again on his own, feet unsteady.

The tears stream anew, recalling with vivid clarity how he and his teacher had roamed this very patch of meadow just two moons ago under the sun that seemed so promising and warm. 

If only he had not been so reckless. If only he had just listened less to the voices and stuck by Byleth’s side, Dimitri would know where he was now. If he was alive now. When the Prince had been thrown onto the back of a cart in shackles at the end of the battle, he recalled Edelgard’s face as a man with a complexion and hair as white as death smiled and told her words that would torment him until his last breath.

“That professor is dead.”

He watched Edelgard’s face drain of all color. That alone was what gave him an inkling of hope that his cherished mentor was still alive. Edelgard was their enemy. Surely, she would not mourn him… 

As much as he hated it, as much as he hated _himself_ for thinking it, he prayed it was not _his_ professor they spoke of, even as a cloth bag was shoved around his head and he was kicked against the back of the cart as they began their journey to the capital.

His remaining eye focuses on the Monastery again, straining without the help of its mate as he’s pulled out of his memories. A vulture circles overhead. He wonders if it’s there for him as he wipes the tears from his cheeks, though it does little more than smear tacky blood and salt across his skin.

An old promise floods his mind.

“ _My strength is yours alone. I will fight as you command. I will kill anyone should you ask it of me.”_

Byleth’s voice fills the empty space then, echoing out over the abandoned mountains, over the plains and the sun that gives its last rays of light to the solemnity that is the destroyed field, once home to halcyon days.

_Dimitri… but will you find me, no matter the state I am in?_

The last glimmer of sunset flickers in his bloodshot blue eye, like an impossible flame lit atop ashes.

“I will find you. I swear it on _all that I am._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!! This is the prologue only, since I wanted to get _something_ published today so I could get some traction with this fic, but I will be writing more tonight and publishing as soon as the next chapter feels finished. I'm trying to do a little less of a hard structure of where one chapter ends and the next begins so I don't wear myself out, let's see how I like it.
> 
> Anyway, please comment and lmk how you feel about this so far! You guys don't know how much comments have an impact on me and keep me inspired and excited for writing the next chapter, so you can help immensely with continuing this if you like it and want more of it!


	2. The Dragon's Egg

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 2 (technically 1, but AO3 doesn't have a prologue chapter function) is finally here! Thank you for waiting! It took a day longer than I wanted it to but please enjoy!

As expected, the Monastery stands as a mere shadow of its former glory whilst it smolders with the flames of ruin. The grounds are quiet as he approaches, and with the descending night, nothing stirs.

His staggered footsteps and shadow cast by the rising moon’s light are the only things to accompany him as he struggles past the gates he had entered so many times before, but they’re crumbling, charred by fire, and the way they loom in their broken appearances haunts him even when he’s left them far behind.

There is nothing left of what used to be the marketplace save for abandoned, empty stalls, and as he limps up the steps and rounds the corner towards the students’ quarters, the man-made pond comes into view at last. He has to stop for a moment to take in the dreadful silence, listening for a sound, _anything at all_ that could tell him someone else survived and returned here with the same hopes as he. To find aid. To find shelter. To reclaim even a fraction of the safety that had been so abruptly stolen by **_her_ ** _._

But his Professor doesn’t sit at the dock as he did the countless times Dimitri found him there, fishing idly with the air of serenity that often lingered about him. 

Just the silence. And the hands that pull him ever back towards the entrance, moaning their anguish in death, how they want him to leave and head straight for Enbarr. Glenn walks beside him, tall and proud, but nose high with anger.

_Will you let her escape? After I died for you? I served my duty to you in ways that I never should have, and you will let her roam free, claiming more lives like she claimed mine? Have you no shame?_

Dimitri stops. Tears prick his eyes yet again. “Glenn… Soon, I _swear it_ . I believe in my Professor. With his help, I can bring _her_ head to you. You, Father, Step-Mother, Dedue… you won’t suffer any longer.”

Glenn is gone with the breath of the wind.

The Prince prays to the goddess he doesn’t believe in that he won’t be smited for venturing into his friends’ rooms in search for anything that might help stop his wounds from festering—as he knows the infirmary would be the Imperial Army’s first destination to claim any remaining healing resources and would, as such, be barren of any such items—but guilt lingers about him nonetheless as he pushes Mercedes’ door open, only to find her belongings already a mess across the floor. His blood runs cold, and he moves on, up the stairs to Annette’s room, which is in similar condition, and by now the hair on his neck is standing on end. A sound from higher up the hill into the dormitories makes him bristle like a lion with hackles raised. 

“Aren’t these brats supposed to be nobles? How come there’s nothing here of value?”

Annette had told him once in passing that she kept an axe against the wall behind her door for emergencies, and just as she said, it was there, standing on its blade in very corner of the room, obviously missed by whoever had entered right before him. He grabs for it, and it looks like it’s never before been used with the complete lack of scratches or dents that would come with time with a well-used weapon. Then, Dimitri catches just a glimpse of his reflection in the surface of the blade, and he can’t recall a time when he’s ever looked so disfigured. The bandage around his eye is soaked all the way up to where it wraps around his hair. His remaining eye is bloodshot and his lids are darkened with lack of sleep. Dirt from sleeping on the ground blots his skin. He’s nearly unrecognizable, but he’s far beyond the point where his appearance bears any significant meaning to him.

Survival is what matters now.

Instinct drives him closer, onto the next set of stairs. He peers over the ledge at a group of three, hoping desperately not to be seen before he’s prepared, and based on their attire he can only assume they’re bandits, here to plunder the Monastery’s treasures after the Knights of Seiros have all scattered. 

He prepares himself to rise for a head-on, charging attack. Three enemies is no problem for him, especially not with a weapon, albeit his lack of axe mastery. But Byleth’s voice stops him, as if he can feel his Professor’s very hand on his shoulder like he often did right before a battle.

_Take them by surprise. You’ll worsen your injuries if they have a chance to anticipate you._

Dimitri’s head turns, hoping he can at least _see_ the face he misses so terribly, but Byleth’s likeness isn’t there to meet him. Even when Dimitri turns forward again to observe, the touch doesn’t return. 

_Remember what I taught you in stealth. Wait for them to turn their backs._

Dimitri creeps forward as they finally head into the last room at the end of the pathway, but he quickly realizes to whom it belongs. Ice injects into his veins. If his Professor’s voice is there to correct him again, he can’t hear it over the sound of his own anger flooding his mind.

The Prince’s shoulders square as he hears what he can only assume is the chair colliding with the floor, followed by the three bandits’ laughter. They haven’t noticed him yet, not even when he first rounds the corner into his Professor’s quarters that they have already begun _defiling._

Two drawers of the desk are already pulled open, papers strewn about and fluttering to the floor, but Dimitri’s moonlit shadow is cast over the trio inside, blotting out the light they were using to raid. His chapped lips pull over his white teeth in a snarl, and before any three of them can react, his crushing grip is already wrenching the first bandit out of the room and throwing him with such horizontal force that he skids against the cobblestone before ricocheting onto the bush beside the small set of stairs. His armor crashes against the ground in a racket of noise, and whatever humor had been in his companions’ faces now drains completely when they realize the murderous intent upon them all.

“ **_You filthy rats_ **,” Dimitri seethes, luring the second and third out of his Professor’s quarters with his very presence, and whatever protest the second bandit began as he drew his weapon was quickly silenced with the blade of Annette’s axe and splattering his cheek with the motion. 

“ _You will pay with your meaningless lives for desecrating a place like this._ ”

The third watches in horror as his companion collapses to the ground, grasping at his throat now flooding with blood, but the Prince gives him not a single moment to repent, grabbing him by the face with a grip that deforms even his helmet. The awareness of a presence behind screams at him until he spins, and with his centrifugal force he sends both the first and third of the trespassers smashing into the barrels beside Byleth’s room.

But that alone won’t be enough to kill them, he knows. And with his teeth bared and glinting in the light of the moon, the formerly untouched axe belonging to his classmate mercilessly cleaves through two breastplates and the rib cages they fail to protect.

Silence. Only the sound of his haggard breathing as the metaphorical crimson fades from his vision, as blood pools at his boots. The detachment he feels from his body as the terror in their faces brands itself like a hot iron into his mind disgusts him, but he can do nothing about it. He feels exponential guilt in the very lack of momentary guilt in killing them; it’s yet another three people whose blood stains his hands. 

He isn’t able to stop staring at them for minutes, forcing himself to witness at length what he’s capable of doing to his victims. But finally, the concern for his Professor’s belongings pulls his weary eye towards the direction of the room, only to be relieved when not a single drop of blood can be seen past the threshold of the door frame. 

The Professor’s quarters were always a place of reassurance, of comfortable silence and respite. How many times had he helped Byleth carry the stacks of parchment and books he needed to grade back to his room—far too much for one person to carry in a single trip—and in turn been offered a sincere thank-you and invitation to tea later on? Dimitri remembers how his heart used to quiver entering this place, to be greeted with the faint scent of lavender, something that always hung about his teacher and his belongings, and to anticipate being able to spend more time with him later. 

A place such as this… it _had_ to be sacred. Perhaps even more sacred than the cathedral itself, as heretical as that would sound if it were spoken aloud.

Dimitri dithers at the threshold, not wanting to enter and drag any of the filthy blood he’s covered in to further contaminate the room, but the soft touch on his shoulder returns when he spots a set of three elixirs in one of the open drawers.

_You’re injured, Dimitri. Take them._

Deep down, a part of him knows the voice he hears can’t belong to his Professor. These aren’t his words, just the internalized memories of the man’s diction and way of speaking, but even so much as thinking that breaks Dimitri’s heart and makes him realize just how very alone he is. And as if his mind recoils from that, Byleth speaks again, softer this time.

_Remember me. Would I have ever denied you safety? Would I have wanted you to be injured as you are now, with your wounds on the verge of festering?_

Dimitri closes his eyes, and the touch becomes warmer, as if Byleth is squeezing him comfortingly.

“No, you would not have. But Professor…”

_Take them. How will you find me if you do not first help yourself?_

Those words sink in, slowly, settling into the depths of his heart as a reminder of the determination he feels within to find that which is most cherished to him, the only man so beloved who has yet to be taken by the cruel hands of war.

…or, so he _desperately hopes_ … 

He does his best to scrape the blood from the soles of his boots, entering to place the chair upright and push it back against the desk, gathering the scattered papers on the floor and slipping them back into the top open drawer which he can only assume was their origin. 

He reaches for the elixirs in the second drawer, but his hands falter when he comes across a letter in distinct penmanship, different from all of the rest of the personal notes and homework he had just put away. It’s the only parchment contained within a drawer full of odds and ends, and as he lifts it closer to his weary eye so it can focus more easily on it, he realizes it’s the very letter he wrote to Byleth moons ago. His handwriting adorns the envelope, and he opens the flap to unfold the paper within. 

_Happy birthday, Professor. It isn’t much, but we got you a gift as a symbol of our gratitude. I hope you will accept it._

He still remembers the nervous twitch in his hands as he had left it on the Professor’s desk the night before his birthday, not having the heart at the time to give the gift to him in person even after having it delivered from Fhirdiad. He had sat the box with the brooch on top of the letter, and though Byleth had begun wearing the brooch immediately—and never took it off, not even for battles—Dimitri had wondered with some idle curiosity whatever had happened to the note. He knew it was none of his business; after all, it was Byleth’s to do with as he pleased, but there is something about finding it here, saved in pristine condition in a special drawer apart from the rest of his general belongings that warms the Prince’s heart.

It is a strange feeling… Love, in the face of all the destruction and hatred of the last fortnight.

Folding it again, Dimitri slips the letter back into the drawer from whence it came, and he takes the set of elixirs, placing them atop the desk and unscrewing the cork of the first. He tips his head back, gulping it down all at once, and it’s only when he does that he realizes how parched he is, how instinctively satisfying it is to feel fluid rush down his throat when the last drink of water he had had was from a stream early this morning. 

The scent isn’t terrible, similar to a concoction, but it’s distinctly more medicinal and leaves more of an _after-smell_ of sorts, in the absence of his ability to taste. Even so, he doesn’t bother with a grimace, knowing that within minutes his wounds will begin to heal, and his more serious injuries will begin to scab over. The threat of suppuration is behind him. 

“Thank you, Professor… I promise I will repay this debt to you.”

Byleth’s voice returns, gentle, as if spoken against his ear. 

_Rest now, Dimitri. Everything here can be replaced. You cannot._

Dimitri tries to ignore the tears that blur his eyes as he shuts the doors, but those gentle hands that never yank and snatch him like the others do guide him closer to the bed, and he relents, leaning the axe within arms reach and submitting himself to the comfort of the sheets that still smell of beloved classroom days and lavender. 

* * *

When Dimitri wakes, the first rays of dawn illuminate the ceiling of the room, and for a moment he can’t seem to recall where he is. The quarters are distinctly his Professor’s, but it isn’t until he sits and feels the pain of his body that his vision is met again with the sight of his bloodstained armor. The axe waits for him exactly where he left it, and the remaining two elixirs sit patiently upon the desk, as if knowing he will have need for them later. 

He groans as he stands, casting a guilty glance to the white spreads of the bed, and sure enough, smudged crimson blots both the pillow and sheets upon which he slept. 

_My selfishness knows no bounds._

“I will repay you…” he mutters with repentance, and he’s off into the crisp morning air, two elixirs slipped into the pouch at his hip as he heads towards the direction of the sauna for fresh linens. The bandages around his eye are heavy, soaked through with congealed blood, and despite the elixir he knows there’s little he can do for it than continue to keep the bandages clean. 

When he strips the old ones, he dares not look in the mirror, not for fear of the disfiguration itself, but instead for laying eyes on what he will subject others to should they see him again. He tears the sheets into wide strips, folding them in half before wrapping them in the same fashion over his eye and around his head. 

He glances into the mirror then, and he grimaces at the sight that meets him. 

A broken prince, with a crown of bandages. 

This is what he has become. 

But then, he thinks to himself, he is not even a prince. The capital has been compromised. Faerghus belongs to a traitor. 

_A filthy fucking traitor._

Rage seethes at the edge of his vision, and the hands pull at him again, unseen claws digging into his shoulders. The voices, they stoop to his ear, hissing, growling, snarling. He can see their reflections beside him. 

_Kill her. You would be such a coward as to run from the city, the country, I left you?_

“Father, no…”

_Take back our home. Will you embarrass the name of Blaiddyd, your title as the Prince of Faerghus? I did not help raise such a son._

“Step-Mother, please… I will make sure you can all rest in peace, I swore it—”

_Find me, Dimitri. I will give you all that you need to appease the dead._

“Professor…”

His voice breaks, shattered into thousands of unrecognizable pieces, and his hands that he hadn’t realized were gripping the sides of the standing mirror similarly shatter the image of him into hundreds of fragments. 

The voices don’t relent. They whisper hatred, disappointment, frustration at his failures, and he can’t take it—

He thrusts himself into the morning air once more, caught in the excruciating liminal space between blind rage and desperation to find any amount of solace in all the brokenness and desolation that has become of the world. His feet lead him in a direction he can’t control, passing the gates he entered and back onto the mountainside overlooking the town below that had been decimated by the fury of a dragon. 

He wonders if that too had been nothing but a hallucination, but seeing as how the buildings still look cleaved in half as if by one massive sword swing, he can hardly bring himself to doubt it. 

But there’s nothing in sight. Not a sign of a single person. No smoke from a campfire, no movement across all the landscape save for deer on distant mountains.

His haggard breathing sounds like that of a struggling animal, but when he attempts to catch his breath, all it leads to is the uncontrolled scream that punches from his lungs and cuts through the crisp morning that had settled over the mountains. 

Adrenaline pounds in his ears with his heartbeat, like he’s in the midst of a battle to the death, and the catharsis curls in his veins and in every clenched muscle, the pain in his body coiling tighter, hissing like flaming iron shoved into icy waters. 

His voice doesn’t die until all the birds have taken to the air, shaken from their perches in the trees, and when his jaw locks once more, his poor vision blurs for the umpteenth time. He can’t remember a time since the Tragedy of Duscur that he was filled with so much unrelenting misery. 

“I do not know where you are, Professor,” he sobs, openly. “I swear I will leave no stone unturned, but _please, merely give me a sign that you are still here—_ ”

Dimitri racks his brain to remember where he had last seen him. On this very slope, he recalls, as he and Claude had been fighting the remnants of the first wave of Imperial soldiers. That was when the dragon had appeared. That was the last he had seen of his Professor, just before the second and final wave…

But… there had been monsters. He remembers them rushing past the front line of the second wave as both he and Claude had been occupied with fighting and covering the rest of the students as they escaped. They had gone left, up ahead, further down the hill.

Left... 

His bleary eye follows that path, meeting with the torn earth and broken wall that guarded the townspeople and students from the side of the cliff. The grass is shredded, and the brick of the wall upon closer inspection is entirely decimated nearly fifty feet across. There had been a struggle between massive beings here; nothing else could have left the claw marks gouged into the earth, but there’s still no sign of his Professor. There are too many tracks here left by the soldiers to pick out the shape of Byleth’s boots, and…

His gaze freezes. 

Lying on the torn ground, wrapped in what had been mud on that day, but now hardened into dirt, is a torn piece of black fabric. It could belong to anyone. 

But Dimitri’s heart races. 

No.

Before he knows it, his hands are already clutched around the fabric, and he’s dropped to his knees in a flurry of movement. He doesn’t feel the pain that shoots through his kneecaps and into his hips, he just palms the fabric in his hands, clearing it of the caked dirt as he inspects it more clearly. 

There’s no mistaking it. This is a piece of his Professor’s cloak. And as he brings it to his nose, the smell of earth clears as he inhales, giving way to the faint scent of lavender. 

The realization hits him like a war hammer, square in the chest and knocking the breath clear from his lungs. He can’t breathe, it’s stopped up in his throat like his lungs just won’t contract to draw in air, and he struggles, clawing his way to the edge of the cliff in horror as it registers there’s a massive circular chunk ripped out of the side of the rock face that he’s certain had previously been a straight edge, just as it is on both sides of the depression. 

_He fell off this cliff—_

_No._

_No no no it can’t be—_

The tears are back, and he’s running with all of his might to where he knows the base of the mountains meet with the rivers below the Monastery.

His lungs are alight with fire, but he doesn’t stop. Doesn’t stop even though he knows there’s no way his Professor could have survived that fall, no matter if he hit the water or the rock. Doesn’t stop even though he knows the fall would have shattered every bone in his body, that not even _he_ as a Blaiddyd, with all of his strength and impossibly resilient bones, would have been able to cling to his life after such a devastating descent. He merely clings to the memory of Byleth cutting clean through the sky itself and bathing the entire Sealed Forest with a crimson like blood as he came back from a dimension beyond the understanding of any mortal such as he. His teacher was gifted the power of the Goddess; there had to be a way he had clung to life if her protection was with him—

**_There had to be a way._ **

Dimitri reaches the base of the mountains, and he eases into the icy spring water, neglecting how it floods through the armor that’s too big for him and bites harshly at his skin. He stumbles to the banks as the rocks give under his boots. For once, the voices are dead silent, and every boulder he comes across is turned, shoved harshly out of the way as if he knows any one of them could be hiding the man he’s so desperate to find. 

His gaze turns upward, and he’s trying to recount where he had been at the top of the mountain, but his lack of decent depth perception makes all the wall of rock blend together, and he abandons the effort entirely. With such a long fall, there’s no telling where the Professor could have gone, especially if he had landed in the water where it could have carried him elsewhere. 

Dimitri continues along the banks, scanning the waters as he goes, leaving no boulder unturned and no felled log unchecked, pressing on for so long that even the light begins to age. Hours pass like minutes. The heavens are tangerine once again. Even so, exhaustion never finds him. Even his hunger and thirst are muted, but he stops nonetheless for a drink when he feels his lip begin to crack and bleed. 

Night settles. The voices return in all of their vengeance, pushing him to his knees, hissing his shortcomings in his ears yet again. The waters grow dark as they flow past him. 

Failure. Regret. Hopelessness. He won’t stop searching, but his heart quivers anticipating the worst. He can’t decide which would be a worse conclusion—never finding his Professor at all, or finding his broken remains at the bottom of this lightless place, so far away from all who loved and cherished him, in a world with only chaos and rising hell without his presence. 

Dimitri bites back another scream, but he can’t hold it in; it tears its way from his throat and shakes the precipices on both sides of this river with such force that loose pebbles are felled from high above. They plunge into the river like rain, only to leave the silence again. 

And its there as he kneels on the banks with turmoil as his only companion that he finds a glimmer of light on the reflection of the river. 

It isn’t the moon. The Prince glances up in search for the crescent in the sky and it’s nowhere within sight. Instead, its origin is further upstream, around the riverbend and nearly out of his line of sight. 

But there’s something there, glimmering like crystal, hidden behind a pile of rock. He doesn’t know what possesses him to rise; in fact, he doesn’t even feel himself do so, but the thuds of his weary footsteps meet the damp banks of the river as he follows the curve of the path, until he’s before the heap of rocks that buries the light. 

It’s no match for his strength. He clears it within seconds where any other person would have struggled with it for hours, but his bloodshot, sky blue eye is alight with hope, with determination, with the pleading gaze of a man who’s at the end of his wit, praying to all of what’s left of holiness that what is before him is what he so despairingly needs it to be. 

Dimitri clears the mud from the surface of the shining stone, impossibly magical at a time and place like this, and what he finds is what he feared in the deepest pits of his being he would never see again. 

Byleth. 

Perfectly encapsulated in a massive egg of crystal. 

Dimitri can barely believe what is left of his vision. He blinks, touching the stone again as he leans closer. The sight of the man is blurred, through fragments of emeralds, azures, and crimsons like opal, but it is unmistakably the form of his Professor that lies within. As if to further shake him from his doubts, his vision meets with the blurred silhouette of the Sword of the Creator right beside him. It’s alight with an orange glow, pulsating as slowly as a tide would roll in from the sea. 

“Professor… _I found you_ ,” he chokes, his gauntlets gripping the opal with unrealized strength, but unlike anything else that would crack in his clutch, the crystal does not. Its surface is smoother than anything he has ever seen, unscratched by the rubble previously surrounding it. 

And despite how it’s the most beautiful thing he has ever laid eyes upon, the Prince can think of nothing but breaking it to release the one within. 

Dimitri sucks in a breath, letting it fill his lungs whilst he prepares himself for the impact; then, his coiled fist rears back. His honed power snaps forward to shatter the stone, and he hears the pleasant, booming crack of his triumph. 

His gaze settles. Then glances upward. There’s no damage to the egg itself, but instead the side of the cliff right behind it, as a fissure opens up until forty feet above where he stands. 

His brows furrow. He checks the stone again, confused, disoriented. He doesn’t understand. His strength has never failed him before; sure, withholding his strength has been a recurring problem with every delicate thing he has ever touched, but never unleashing it. And in his haze his arm snaps back again with the full might of his body, and the second crack that meets the base of those cliffs sounds like mighty thunder itself, stentoriously echoing for whole leagues in each direction. The cliff cracks even further up, and loose rubble comes raining down upon the waters of the river once again. 

Yet the opal remains the same, untouched by his strength, unbothered by even the _Blaiddyd_ who tries to break it. 

Dimitri laughs. He can’t stop it as his expression twists to one of horror, and he laughs so hard his lungs hurt, that he convulses with it, and he’s horrified by his own lack of emotional restraint, how twisted his mind is that he could _roar with it_ at a time like this, as devoid of true humor as it all is. 

His hands grip the stone again, as if he’s shaking it.

“Professor, _please_ tell me this is a joke. I’ve lost my mind, _this can’t be real_ . There’s no way you’re stuck in there and I can’t get you out; **_this can’t be real_ **—”

But it is. And somewhere between the confused laughter and the disbelief that he feels, his howls descend back into sobs, and he’s brought to his knees with his forehead pressed against the cold stone that seals his Professor from even time itself. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter hurt me a lot to write considering how bad Dimtri's mental illness gets in it but... I hope you all enjoyed reading. Please do let me know how you felt about it in the comments, it helps me more than you know to inspire me to keep writing the next chapter!
> 
> Also, if you guys feel so inclined, I was let go from my job recently, so if you like my free works enough, please consider donating? Thank you so much <3 Here's my [GoFundMe](https://www.gofundme.com/f/i-was-let-go-suddenly-help-ren-make-rent-amp-move?utm_medium=copy_link&utm_source=customer&utm_campaign=p_na+share-sheet&rcid=6ff845174f774f22bbd3a871a8da4566)


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